


Dazzle and Mysteries

by AuroraCloud



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Alien Planet, F/F, F/M, First Meetings, Kissing, Remix, Temporary Character Death - Jack Harkness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-10
Updated: 2017-09-10
Packaged: 2018-12-26 02:21:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,920
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12049320
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AuroraCloud/pseuds/AuroraCloud
Summary: This planet presents more mysteries than Jenny expected, but not more than she can handle. And, of course, there is running.





	Dazzle and Mysteries

**Author's Note:**

  * For [navaan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/navaan/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Not Just Another Mystery](https://archiveofourown.org/works/5415632) by [navaan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/navaan/pseuds/navaan). 



Jenny knows right from wrong, even if most of the time she has trouble explaining it. And she is fairly sure that this here, dancing here with this enticing lady who is holding her below the waist, is wrong, though she can’t explain it. It might be that the smile on her face is just a little much, or maybe a lot much, and it’s very possible that she is actually insane. But she seems darn intriguing and clever anyway, and Jenny thinks people’s rules about sanity are a bit vague, anyway. But still, something isn’t quite right. Maybe even a lot not right.

Not only the smile, there is also something about the bitingly sweet sound of her voice as she enquires Jenny’s name, that makes Jenny realize this is very, very wrong for entirely different reasons.

But she can’t figure out the reasons, and she is burning so deliciously, and then the lady kisses her and it's oh, so good, and she has a perfume about her reminding Jenny of libraries and burnt lands and exotic spices from faraway planets. Her tongue tastes of tea and purple and something that calls to her and says home. She doesn't know what home means here. It can't be Messaline. The lady has nothing to do with Messaline, and neither has Jenny. And Jenny knows that if the lady will ask her to her cabin, Jenny will certainly go, right or wrong, because there is a mystery right here that she is dying to unravel, not to mention a curious burning to sate.

She presses herself against the lady's tightly clad bosom, plunges her tongue into that enticing mouth, and grabs as though holding onto dear life. The lady is participating, and judging from the sounds she is making, she is enjoying it every bit as much as Jenny is.

But when she lets go and looks at Jenny, the expression in her eyes in quizzical. 

"Who are you?" she asks.

For a moment, Jenny thinks that somehow, this lady knows. But Jenny has learned to take care of herself, and she disguises her curiosity with a flick of her ponytail. "Oh, just Jenny. Do I get to know your name?"

The lady smiles, tracing the vein in Jenny's neck with her delicate finger. Jenny shivers. "I'm called many things. Friends get to call me Missy."

Jenny can't decide if the name suits her well or badly, but she knows she likes the feel of Missy's finger on her neck, and she arches up to the touch. A part of her brain is still frantically trying to place this lady and why she feels so strangely familiar. She feels the hands scouting up her sides, resting just underneath her bosom. When she opens her eyes, she finds that Missy's eyes are closed, and an eerie feeling comes over her.

"Well, Missy, do I get to be your friend?" Jenny asks.

Missy's eyes blink open, and stare hard and searching into Jenny's. Then she leans across and whispers to Jenny's ear: "Perhaps another day." Her breath is oddly cool against Jenny's skin, yet Jenny burns where Missy's fingers lay against her sides. Missy steps away.  


"What?" Jenny asks, worried and confused.

Missy smiles, a cool, enticing smile. "I'll be back for you."

"Why are you going now?"

"Matters to attend to, my dear."

And with that, she steps into the crowd. And though with her incongruous clothing and her triumphant bearing, she ought to be easy to spot anywhere, Jenny can't find her again.  


Such a tease.

Well, she is in a new city, full of promises to explore. She isn't going to let one strange lady bother her. Yet she sleeps little that night. The unsated desire in her is battling with parts of her mind that she is unused to exploring, yet are opening now for reasons she doesn't know.

She is new to this planet, the second rock planet on the life zone of a red dwarf that is now glowing beautifully on the hazy sky of the late morning. The city, Ternogh, is a hub where many cultures and beings come together. It is the kind of city she loves, towering with skyscrapers and watchtowers and diverse populations. Here, all the different species of the sector mix and mingle like they’ve always known each other. The brown reptilian-like natives whose names she can’t pronounce but who have a darn awe-inspiring music sense, humans from various planets, airborne Gasthen from the neighboring planet, and blue bipedal beings she has never seen before, they all gather together and share knowledge — share life. Jenny has learned that in places like this, though there is conflict, there is also growth and collaboration and learning. Wonders wait behind every corner. Struggle and wonders, they go hand in hand and it's fantastic.

So with all this in front of her, Jenny banishes the thoughts of the strange lady from her mind, banishes the yearning. She has learned from the Doctor and from Donna something about right and wrong, and she senses there was something not at all right about the way Missy was playing with her. She will go on and meet this city, all the wonders and all the experiences drowning out that tingling fire, that sense of home that is all wrong.

She is not far advanced into the day, when a prickly strange feeling descends on her. Her skin is tingling, as though the air is charged. She scrunches up her nose. Something isn’t right. She turns to look around the viewing platform. There is no sight of the strange lady, nobody who could even possibly be her. And then Jenny realizes that the sensation is not at all like the one caused by the lady. Strange, yes, but different strange. Not unpleasant. Not wrong. Just strange. Exciting and unusual, perhaps.

She sees him. Leaning against a balustrade, tall and handsome, but that is not the most attractive thing about him. Though his clothes make him stand out like a foreigner, an anachronism, he leans casually with the posture of a man at home in this time and place, at home anywhere, perhaps.

She can't look away. There's something about him. Then he turns to look towards her, and she sees that not only is he attractive, but also has dazzling blue eyes. And there is a glint in his eyes that Jenny recognizes. It means adventure.

She grins. That catches his eye. He smiles back.

Of course, that is when a shadow falls over the city. People look up, surprised, then scared. A massive spaceship has appeared in the sky, darkening the beautiful sunny day, the threat clear. Air space above the city doesn't even allow small aircrafts.

Damn. Just when she had had a completely different kind of adventure in mind. Oh well.

She activates her ship's teleport remotely, and before anyone knows, she is on the ship above the city, away from the frightened crowd milling underneath. She takes a quick look at what is around her, noting the technology and the squabble armored soldiers. Sontarans. Well, luckily she knows just the thing. She smiles and takes a tiny blackout box out of her belt. She has kept it around since she ran into a Dalek that wanted to exterminate everything, especially someone with two hearts. It was handy then and will come in handy now.

With a few presses of the buttons she has disabled their command centre systems, and when the first Sontarans notice that she is the wrong shape and too blonde to be one of them, she successfully dives out of the way of the bullets.

Then she does the thing she has always known best: run. She figures it's the best chance of avoiding them until she can enable her own teleport again. 

When she turns a corner, she crashes into a strong, much too tall body there. The impact makes her crash back into a metal wall with a grunt.

“Whoa," a male voice says. “Careful there, sweetheart."

She looks up in surprise, noticing for the first time, that the strange feeling is back; the world feels like it had made one step to the side. It's strange and disorienting, but then it feels intriguing again. “It's you," she says in surprise and the man grins at her, recognizing her too. But she isn't sure if she is talking about him being the guy she found intriguing or him being the source of that strange and powerful strangeness she is feeling. There is no time to ponder either of these options as the Sontarans follow them on their stubby legs and fire at will.

She laughs despite herself, as she takes his hand and pulls him along and unexpectedly he laughs too. “What did you do?"

“Messed up their control centre. Come on! Run for your life."

He laughs loudly and follows easily. “They can't move?" he asks.

“Better. The moment they reboot they will find that the ship is going on auto, and new coordinates have been set. They'll be out of here as fast as they've come."

"I hope so." The man frowns. "Can't figure out what they were doing here, but I have a feeling we'll find out soon enough."

Jenny has no time to ask what he means, as they round a corner and she pulls them into an empty room. When she stops to close the door behind them, the man hold up his arm and presses a few buttons on a device on his arm. Is that a vortex manipulator?” Jenny asks, peering closer. ”That’s how you got here? That's awesome. It's the first time I'm seeing one up close.”

“Yeah,” he admits with a smile. “I did not expect to have company up here.”

“Apart from Sontarans?”

“Yeah.”

“I’m Jenny,” she tells him and grins widely. “And I love danger. Nice to meet you properly.”

He smiles a dazzling smile that instantly makes her feel warm and light. “Hello. I’m Jack. Want to hitch a ride back down to the planet?”

“Why not?" She doesn't hesitate, but hops over to him, her arms latching onto his strong shoulders like that was the invitation. This close she can smell the pheromones, enticing and beckoning. It's still just a backdrop to the intriguing tingling feeling that surrounds him. Nevertheless, she presses close to him on a whim, and finds out that the doesn't resist.

"Not so fast, young lady."

She remembers that voice, though it spoke only a few flirtatious sentences to her. She wheels around and sees the lady from last night, on the dance floor, advancing in her magnificent gear, predatory smile on her face. Jenny feels her innards turn to ice. 

"You," she sputters.

"Told you I'd come back, my pretty." The lady's smile is cold yet attractive, a twisted charm.

She feels a strong arm around her shoulders. "I'm warning you, don't come any closer", Jack says. Normally Jenny would scoff and tell him she can take care of herself, but she is glad of an ally now. Her gut feeling tells her that Missy is much more dangerous than the Sontarans alone. Besides, she doesn't mind his arm around her. 

"Or what? You'll shoot me?" Missy laughs a brittle laugh and shifts her attention to Jack instead. Jenny feels dizzy. Those two both exert their fields of strangeness, and it's disorienting. It's different in each, but they both distort her sense of reality, like the space-time around them is behaving differently. She has to grab Jack for support, and she hates that, she is never less than strong. His frame is steadying, but something else about him is not. Missy looks at Jenny as though seeing exactly what is happening her, and smiles, then returns her attention back to the man. "Ever so ready with the gun, Jack. Think your dear Doctor would approve?"

Jenny jerks and draws in a breath, but neither of the others seems to notice. Beside her, Jack has frozen still.

"You speak like you know me, but I don't know you."

"You only think you don't." The lady laughs again. "Come on, add it up already. You humans are so slow. Even with immortality."

Immortality. That must be what it is. The Doctor was a Time Lord, he said that. Immortality must do something strange to Time. Then what about the lady?

She realized that the lady had fixed a piercing stare on her, smiling. "Ooh, wheels starting to turn in your lovely head?" She crossed over to Jenny, and though the man made a move to stop her, she ignored him and stood just a breath away from Jenny. Jenny feels her hearts beating hard, and a distinct quivering inside her. About one third fear and two thirds damnable attraction.

Jack grasps Missy's arm and tries to pull her away from Jenny. Try being the operative word; Missy won't budge, and flicks Jack aside with one strong shove.  


"Don't play with me, Jack Harkness." Missy's eyes never leave Jenny's face. "I've got more intriguing quarry than you now."

Jack draws in a breath and sounded somewhat freaked out. "Who are you?"

"You've met me. Aren't you more interested in who she is?" Missy steps closer into Jenny's personal space, looks into her eyes, and smiled. Jenny does not smile back, but neither does she protest when the lady bens to press the ghost of a kiss on her lips.  
In fact, she allows her lips to part and kisses her back rather more. "You damnable tease," she whispered against her lips.

The lady pulls back. "I can taste Time in you. Fascinating." She laid her hands on Jenny's chest in a movement that was considered rather forward in most human-populated systems, but was not unpleasant for Jenny. "Two hearts beating. How did you manage that? You are not a Time Lord, yet you are." Her expression reminds Jenny of someone coveting at an incredibly precious piece of cake. Well, perhaps a little more serious.  


"Time Lord?" Jenny hears Jack gasp. She is aware that both of them are fixing their eyes on her now. No sense asking right now who Jack is and what he knows about 

Time Lords. He knows, that much is clear.  
"Well, you see, it's kind of complicated..."  


"Who are you?" Jack looks at her warily now, and she hates to have lost his trust.  


Missy laughs. "A strange little hybrid, this one. No wonder you two get along so well. Now, I didn't say it's not pretty. I'm sure we three could come to a lovely little agreement."  


Suddenly, several things happen at once. Missy grabs Jenny by the waist. Jenny reacts with her natural instincts and knowledge, twisting free from her grasp, but at the same time Jack lunges at them both and also tries to free Jenny. Missy turns towards Jack, a brief cold flash on her face barely registering on Jenny, and she does something so quick that Jenny doesn't see it. But suddenly Jack is cast off his feet, and he lands lifeless on the floor. Jenny screams and rushes to him. But she knows he is dead before she even has time to check his pulse. She doesn't ask herself how she knows.  


She turns to look furiously at Missy, who is standing calmly again. "Don't worry, my dear, he always comes back. Ugh, you feel it too, don't you? The way he is."  


She nods, unable to form words. Missy takes a breath. "Now, for a moment or two, I won't be getting headache from standing near a Fact. So very complicated. The Doctor was silly to let it happen. Of course, he is terribly handsome, so it's nice to not waste it. I've heard he's really good in bed, too."  


"You haven't tried yourself, then?"  


"Not yet." Missy steps close to her. "What are you, little one? And what are you doing with him?"  


"Just a coincidence," Jenny says. She doesn't elaborate which question she is answering.  


"You did not come from Gallifrey."  


"No," she answers, and decides to see what truth will cause. "Ever heard of Messaline?"  


Seems she has, for her eyes widen. "So that's what it is. He stumbled across that place -- of course he would -- and they made you out of him?"  


"In a nutshell, yes."  


"I'd wager they got a bit more than they bargained for."  


"Yeah." She grins.  


"And then he just left you, did he?"  


"I guess. I died, you see, and then I woke up and I had to take a spaceship and go away. Complicated. So I think he thought I'd died, too. I've been looking for him." 

"And you haven't met anyone else with a bit of Time Lord ever since, have you?" There is a wistfulness in Missy's eyes, and Jenny knows now why she, in all her wrongness and dangers, feels like home. She allows herself to be pulled into a kiss.  


But then she pulls away. "I've learned some things. And the Doctor, and Donna, they wouldn't want me learning from someone who kills without a second thought."  


Missy narrows her eyes, and it occurs to Jenny that she doesn't know Missy's thoughts. She hesitates for a heartbeat.  


She hears a painful gasp, like air squeezing into empty lungs, and when she looks, Jack has jerked awake and stares at her. His breath is still heaving and he looks shaky, but he sits up. "Get away from her. She's danger."  


"Figured it out, have you?" Missy crosses her arms.  


"Yes, I have, _Master_." He glares at her.  


"It's Mistress now." She smiles and looks at Jenny. "Missy to friends."  


Jack's jaw tightens. "You're friends now?"  


"Her definition, not mine," Jenny says. With her instincts, she knows that Jack is the better and more trustworthy of the two, and doesn't want him to get the wrong ideas. "I know now she's a Time Lord and knows the Doctor, but the jury's still out on everything else."  


"You know the Doctor?" Even amidst worry and fear, something like wistfulness seemed to flit through Jack's face.  


"I... He..." Jenny frowns. "I have his genes. But I'm not really a Time Lord. It's a long story. Better told some other time."

Missy chuckles. "Can you see, handsome Jack, why I was quite eager to figure out what she was on about and what you two were doing together?"

"Oh, we were just getting acquainted," Jenny says.p />

"Quite the accident," says Jack. "She loves danger, and so do I."  


Missy walks to up to Jack, who has hauled himself standing up, more or less recovered from his death. "And what do you think of me?"

Jack narrows his eyes. 

She presses her face close to his and smiles, baring her teeth. "If you both love danger, then don't I come in right there?"

"I want nothing from you, Mistress." Jack casts a dark look at her. 

"Oh, come on." Her eyes glint. "You if anybody should know that when a Time Lord regenerates, the new one isn't quite like the other, and might treat people in quite different ways."

Jack looks back at her defiantly, and Jenny can see that there is a whole history passing wordlessly here. "I see no proof of that with you so far."

"Oh, do forgive me for that little death. I knew it won't bother you for long. I just needed a little time alone with Jenny here. Besides..." She cocks her head elegantly. "Of course it's entirely inappropriate of you to keep being around forever like that, most unbecoming. But one can't expect any less of you, can one? Who knows how I'll take to it in this body. I might have kinks."

Jenny is pretty sure that Jack actually needs to exert some self-control to keep glaring at her. "I'm sure you do, but I don't approve of anyone threatening my friends or innocent gorgeous cities."

"Oh, the Sontarans, they were just a handy way to get you both up here..." Missy steps right into Jack's personal space, and traces a finger along his neck. He looks steadfast, but Jenny can smell the pheromones in the air. "At my mercy."

Jack leans ever so slightly towards her, and the very air seems to quiver, or maybe it's just Jenny's time sense. She sees Jack lift his hands to Missy's waist, and can't decide if she feels jealous or thrilled. But a breath before Jack's mouth would meet Missy's, he suddenly twists her aside and spins across the room to Jenny, throwing his arms around her. As he presses some buttons on his wriststrap, Jenny hears a delighted laugh from Missy.

"Knew you would do that, Captain Harkness. Ooh, I do so love playful quarry." But then Jenny hears no more as the room spins away from them and they get sucked into the Vortex, Jack's arms holding her steady so they don't lose each other in the whirlwind of time and space.

Then they stand on the surface of the planet again, a little distance from the crowd, and Jenny heaves in deep breaths, trying to find her feet again. Her teleport is definitely more comfortable.

Safe for the moment, yet Jenny knows that Missy will not be far behind. She allows herself to relax against Jack. Even when she blinks out of focus and back, she is hyper-aware of his presence. "You are always there. How can that be? I can feel you," she breathes, solid ground underneath her. A Fact, Missy had said.

Jack's arms are around her, holding her steady.

He blinks down at her, looking surprised. He does not seem to be used to being surprised. He is used to being the mystery, she thinks. She likes surprising him. She also likes surprising Missy. Intriguing her, even. The heat pooling in her belly and lower reminds her what a dangerous game she is playing. She might as well continue that, and leave out a few steps in the process of introducing herself to Jack Harkness. She leans up to kiss him.

He kisses back. And wow, does he know how to kiss.

It leaves her light headed and breathless - and there is the alluring draw, the feeling that this person calling himself Jack is different from anyone she's ever met. This is just a kiss. And only the beginning.

So many mysteries to unravel.

“It's really nice to meet you, Jenny," he says and his blue eyes are glinting.

“Likewise, Jack. Let me buy you a drink, huh?"

For some reason that makes him grin even wider. “Why not? But maybe we should move a little bit away from the crazy Time Lady first."

"Maybe," she agrees. "Think she wants to kill us, or seduce us? Or both."

He shrugs. "Probably both. Run?"

She grins. "Most likely."

He looks at her as if he's looking at an enticing riddle. She thinks that he is used to being the mystery, not to finding others mysterious. But Jenny has already decided who is going to unravel who here. It's going to be an exciting experience. And with Missy on their heels, it's going to be just that much more thrilling.

Life is complex.

But some decisions are easy.

Jenny sees Missy materializing behind them and breaks into a run, but only after throwing back a challenging grin. Some decisions are easier than they should be.


End file.
